Life Sentence — Not Death — In Jewelry Store Murders

HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) _ A Connecticut jury has spared a New York man from the death penalty for fatally shooting a couple during a robbery attempt at their Fairfield jewelry shop. The Bridgeport Superior Court jury decided Friday that Christopher DiMeo should spend the rest of his life in prison with no chance for parole. DiMeo was convicted in February of killing jewelers Kim and Tim Donnelly in 2005.

Lawyers for the former Queens, N.Y., man said he didn’t deserve the death penalty. But prosecutor Joseph Corradino argued that Kim Donnelly saw her husband killed in front of her and felt the terror of her own impending death. DiMeo is already serving a life prison sentence in New York for killing Long Island jewelry store owner Thomas Renison in 2004.